Korea to face U.S. in ‘Premier 12′ final

The Twins have until December 8 to sign Park, who had a. 343 batting average and 146 RBIs this season for Nexen Heroes.

Although a few former big leaguers participated in the Premier 12 – veteran righty Freddy Garcia pitched for Venezuela, for example – it includes non-40-man roster players only.

“You never want to lose your third hitter, a closer and a set-up guy”, Randolph said.

Byung-Ho Park came to the plate for South Korea in the top of the 4th inning.

Tetsuto Yamada hit two of Samurai Japan’s five home runs as the host nation routed Mexico 11-1 in the third-place playoff on Saturday afternoon at Tokyo Dome in a game ended in the seventh inning by the mercy rule.

Earlier, Japan first baseman Sho Nakata reached home on a Ryosuke Hirata single – which also advanced right fielder Akira Nakamura – after being walked in the bottom of the third to open the scoring. Yasuaki Yamasaki tossed a ideal seventh inning.

Juan Perez hit a solo homer for Mexico in the sixth.

The tournament is organized by the World Baseball Softball Confederation with games taking place at both the Tokyo Dome and the Sapporo Dome along with other smaller venues throughout Japan.

The WBSC was using the tournament to showcase baseball’s popularity in the region as the sport bids to be re-instated at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.